


Afternoon Delight

by empressearwig



Category: Pink Carnation Series - Lauren Willig
Genre: F/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-18
Updated: 2012-12-18
Packaged: 2017-11-21 10:09:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/596479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/empressearwig/pseuds/empressearwig
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Miles and Henrietta spend a rainy afternoon together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Afternoon Delight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [magisterequitum](https://archiveofourown.org/users/magisterequitum/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide, magisterequitum!

"What shall we do today?" asked Henrietta. She peered outside through the heavy damask drapery in their sitting room. "It looks like the rain will last long enough to cancel my outing to the park with Charlotte."

"I have plans to meet Geoff at White's," Miles said unthinkingly, as he peered in their looking glass while fussing with his cravat. "Dash it all, is this thing straight?" I think Downey's gone cross-eyed."

"Hm," said Henrietta.

Miles froze in place. _Hm_ was not good. _Hm_ was downright dangerous, in fact. For a single syllable, it inspired an outsize amount of terror in his bones.

Slowly, Miles turned to face Henrietta. There were no outward signs of displeasure, but still, Miles hadn't been a married man for nearly a year without learning a thing or two about reading his wife's body language.

"I meant, of course, that I'm staying home with you," he backtracked as fast as he was able. "Wouldn't think of anything else. Can't think what I was saying."

Henrietta gave him a brilliant smile in response. "Thank you, darling."

Inwardly, Miles gave a sigh of relief. Outwardly, he puffed out his chest just a little. Surely, if there were some sort of award for husbandly perception, he would be a shoo-in to win.

"Miles?" prompted Henrietta.

He snapped back to attention, having completely missed whatever she'd said. Perhaps not a shoo-in after all. "What was that?"

"While I'm delighted that you'll be spending the afternoon with me, that does not settle the question of what we're going to _do_." Henrietta looked adorably disgruntled as she spoke. Miles didn't think it would be wise to mention it. "Have you any ideas?"

Miles thought fast. An indoor afternoon activity for two. He dismissed his first thought out of hand, because it was clear that Henrietta was not in the mood to hear the suggestion that they return to the comfort of their marital bed. But what was that she had mentioned about doing something with Charlotte in the park? That was it.

"A picnic," he said firmly. "It's just the thing."

"It's raining," Henrietta said, with an accompanying worried look as if he were slow enough to have missed that rather obvious fact.

Miles was almost hurt. He wasn't Turnip Fitzhugh, after all.

He shook his head. He really had to stop wool-gathering mid-conversation. "An indoor picnic," he amended. "Leave it all to me."

Henrietta's expression shifted from worry to delight in an instant. "What a good idea," she said. She came closer and wrapped her arms around his neck, drawing his head down for a kiss lingering enough that it had Miles reconsidering if he'd been wrong to not suggest the bedroom after all.

But then she drew back and patted him on the chest. "Until later, then."

Miles watched Henrietta walk away, her hips swaying in a way that couldn't be read as anything other than deliberately seductive. He was sure that if he were to look back in the glass, he would look like an utter simpleton. 

Until later, indeed.

*

"I really don't understand why you insisted on blindfolding me," said Henrietta, as she picked her way down the hall. Her hands were outstretched in front of her, fumbling for the walls, despite the fact that Miles's hands were resting on her shoulders steering her in the right direction.

He thought he should be offended by the lack of trust, but then he had been party to a fair number of pranks when they'd been children. He supposed that trusting him with a blindfold was a privilege he hadn't yet earned.

"It's a surprise," he said patiently, despite the fact that it must have been the fifth time in less than fifty yards. "You like surprises. And anyway, we're here."

"But where is--" Henrietta started to say.

Miles untied the blindfold and let the scarf fall away.

"--here," she finished. She twisted back in his arms. "Oh, Miles."

He beamed. "I did do a good job, didn't I?" 

She rose up on her slippered toes to press a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth. "Yes. And don't say anything more or you'll spoil it."

"I wouldn't want to do that," Miles said. He nudged her forward into the music room, where a blanket was already spread on the floor awaiting them. "Your seat, my lady."

"Thank you," Henrietta said demurely, accepting his helping hand as she lowered herself to the ground. Once seated, she patted the spot next to her. "Sit."

"That sounded more like an order you'd give to a dog than to your husband," Miles grumbled, but he did what he was told and sat.

"However it might have sounded, I assure you that I do know the difference," Henrietta said. She cupped her hand around the back of his neck and drew him closer. "For instance, I wouldn't do this to a dog."

She kissed him. The kiss started out teasing, just a nibble of his lip, and a gentle swipe of her tongue against his. But then, without being entirely sure how it had happened, Miles found himself flat on his back with Henrietta on top of him.

"Mmph," he said, trying to disentangle himself from her hungry lips and roving hands. "Hen!"

She pulled back just far enough for her to be able to look down on his face. "What's wrong?"

"Don't you want some champagne?" he asked desperately, trying to remember that though this had been his desired outcome he'd meant to be a gentleman first. "Or oysters? There are oysters!"

"No," Henrietta said, shaking her head. She studied him curiously, until he felt like one of the field specimens that he'd studied at university. A knowing smile dawned on her face, and he squirmed under her attention. "Miles, my love, were you under the impression that you had to _seduce_ me?"

"No," he denied, rather too quickly for it to be believable. 

Henrietta arched a solitary eyebrow at him, and he crumpled like the Italians under Bonaparte's invasion.

"Maybe?" he tried again, hoping to spare himself some dignity, but the eyebrow was having none of it. "Yes."

Henrietta leaned forward once more, and pressed her lips against the side of his throat. "And just why did you think that I would need seducing? Haven't I always been extremely amenable to suggestions of such activities?"

Miles nodded, his hands coming up to frame her face. " _Extremely_ amenable," he agreed. "But you seemed, well, irritated this morning, and so I thought I had better pave the way to such a suggestion. Besides, a well planned seduction can be a great deal of fun, you know. When your wife isn't spoiling the occasion for you, that is."

"I do have a habit of doing that, don't I?" said Henrietta ruefully.

"Yes, but I love you in spite of it," Miles said. He drew her back down for another kiss, one that didn't have the slightest bit of teasing about it. When it ended, her eyes were glazed and her breathing uneven, and her hair was half tumbled from her coiffure, Miles noted with satisfaction. "Now, are you sure I can't interest you in any champagne?"

Henrietta's lips on his was all the denial he wanted.


End file.
